Place names

Information from 'English Place Names' 1961 by Kenneth Cameron: Other information from 'History of the Colne Valley' by D F E Sykes

OE = Old English; OD = Old Danish; ON = Old Norse

badger = pedlar, often of food

balmforth = foaming or rapid stream

bank = bank or ridge (OD)

bent = a grassy or reddy area

blake = pale in colour

booth = temporary shelter (OD)

carr, or car = land recovered by draining a boggy area (ON)

clough = a valley with steep sides, forming the bed of a stream (OE)

Colne = D F E Sykes equates 'Colne' to the Celtic 'Glyn', meaning a narrow valley

delph = a dug pit or trench

den, or dene = valley, usually wooded (OE)

Eastergate = corruption of Esther. Esther Schofield owned the nearby pub of, the Packhorse Inn

edge = edge or ridge

firth = wood (OE)

fold = enclosed area for animals

gate = street or way (ON)

Golcar = Sykes conjectures that this is a Celtic word for Beacon fire. He also suggests it means the rock of Saint Guthlac (a missionary from the mother church at Dewsbury). This personal name derivation is preferred by Cameron.

greave - grave, or pit

haigh, haugh = hill, usually steep (in OE also a narrow secluded valley)

hey, hay = enclosure (OE)

holme = a piece of flat, low-lying ground near a river, liable to flood (ON)

holt = wood (OE)

ings = Viking word for a marsh or meadow (inga)

intake = land taken in to use from the wilderness

kirk = church

lea, or lee, or ley, or lay = pasture, or untilled land, or meadow (OE)

lin = flax (ON)

lockwood = enclosed woodland

lund = grove of trees

Marsden = Marchdene, boundary valley

moss = moor

owler = alder tree (OE)

royd = Clearing, or field (OE)

scale = summer dwelling

Scapegoat Hill = corruption of Slip-cote, which was a form of cream cheese

scar = rocky outcrop or cliff

Slaith = sloe, blackthorn

syke = a small stream, often dry in summer

thorp = daughter settlement, or farm (OD)

throstle = thrush

thwaite = forest clearing, or meadow in a low situation (ON)

Wilherlee = wild boar lea

worth = enclosure (OE)

Placenames on the 1904 OS Map